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I would put POAAF at the very bottom. It's the most dated and the writing is the weakest of any MM album. THEOL and BV might be Manson by-the-numbers, but they have their moments and are much better, imho.

EMDM may just be Manson's most divisive album. I know a lot of fans hate it, but I fucking love it.

POAAF is my favorite album on most days. It didn't take itself seriously and the bands creepy vibe and image wasn't as shoehorned and forced like later albums. It had light social commentary and it hits the spot musically.

POAAF is my favorite album on most days. It didn't take itself seriously and the bands creepy vibe and image wasn't as shoehorned and forced like later albums. It had light social commentary and it hits the spot musically.

Exactly!, I miss that Manson, little less "artsy" and much more "kitch".
Shame we did not get another "Spooky Kids Album", "Smells like children" is the last one with the "American Family" concept, then things started to get very serious with "Antichrist Superstar".

I can't stand "Eat Me, Drink Me", mostly for it's "Woe is me" lyrics, musically it's not great either, but is not as bad as "High end of Low".

Been a fan since '95 and fell out of love sometime in 2008. The High End of Low was a huge disappointment and my headspace had radically altered. Anyways... I've been revisiting the albums again recently mostly to laugh at my teenage self. Hearing Manson's discography now feels like a guilty pleasure. I'll probably always check out whatever he releases because the 15 year old me cannot resist.... Here's how I would rank things... From '95-'07 he could do no wrong imo

01 Mechanical Animals (the peak)
02 Antichrist Superstar (honestly is #1 some days)
03 Holy Wood (best vocal performance)
04 Eat Me, Drink Me (seriously underrated goddamnit!!)
05 The Golden Age of Grotesque (better than I remember)
06 Portrait of an American Family (dated but has the nostalgia factor)
07 The Pale Emperor (would have ranked higher if not for the lyrics)
08 The High End of Low (could have been great if edited)
09 Born Villain (this album is a real piece of shit)

Agreed, but it doesn't have to be considered "more than a remix EP." That's what it is, man. If you like it so much it deserves to be in your rank, just include it! If I thought NIN had a remix release as strong as one of the albums, I'd do the same – they almost got there with Things Falling Apart.

Oh, I'd say it absolutely does. It stands apart from a straight remix work like TFA or YZR, far as I'm concerned. Smells Like Children has four straight remixes, a complete rerecording of Dope Hat, an acoustic live song, three covers, and a bunch of weird audio experiments and skits. That's why calling it a remix EP bugs me; it kinda discredits everything else on there, and clocking in at nearly an hour it's way longer than your average EP, too.

If it was just one cover on there and a bunch of remixes like TFA, I'd be calling it a remix album, sure, but it feels like more than that to me. Not necessarily an album, not a cover or remix work but....just an hour of weird, nicely varied, drug-fueled goodness. People toss Broken up on NIN lists all the time, and rightfully so; same scenario applies here for me.

Been a fan of Mechanical Animals album for years.. Never could get into Antichrist Superstar even though I loved The Beautiful People..in 1996 my sister was the Antichrist Superstar fan and I was the Downward Spiral fan. but for some reason I started listening to Antichrist Superstar again and it's really strong. I'd say it's better than Mechanical Animals.

Manson sounds like a real monster on this one. and I like the satanic cryptic lyrics.

Been a fan of Mechanical Animals album for years.. Never could get into Antichrist Superstar even though I loved The Beautiful People..in 1996 my sister was the Antichrist Superstar fan and I was the Downward Spiral fan. but for some reason I started listening to Antichrist Superstar again and it's really strong. I'd say it's better than Mechanical Animals.

Manson sounds like a real monster on this one. and I like the satanic cryptic lyrics.

I always found it the stronger and more cohesive work. The concept is there but it flows from song to song easily and lets you interpret it differently than say stuff on MA does.

I think it's a really exciting, interesting hot mess trainwreck of an album. The title is pretty perfect and it's just a weird listen in a number of ways. If you ranked every song and kept the upper half and dropped the bottom, you'd probably have one of his most well-done records, but because of all of it intermingled, it results in a chaotic, bizarre, mood-swinging jumbled madhouse of an album and, to be perfectly honest, I couldn't think of a more fitting thing for the guy at that time. For better or for worse it accurately depicts that time period in Mansonland and it's got enough quality there to hook me back in for the occasional listen. I think it's a really wounded, insulted attempt at recapturing what people liked about him after the highly-personal and intimate EMDM was loathed by fans and it was maybe the first time we really got Marilyn Manson doing things he didn't necessarily want to do, which resulted in some of the half-baked, half-assed moments of it, but he tried to blend it with what was more authentic to him at the time.

The very fact that he seemingly out of nowhere and for no apparent reason fired Skold, who he'd just been singing the praises of as "the most in touch a musician has ever been with my needs as an artist," rehired Twiggy, a sure-fire bet to restore confidence in the "brand," and then turned around and behaved as though Skold was "writing with his wallet" really goes to show how much the guy was desperately trying to find whatever would make the thing work again rather than totally doubling down on what he was feeling. You have this guy who just a few short years before didn't even wanna make music anymore who felt really inspired to come back and then got shit on for it, and because it was so personal, ended up taking it way more personally than he ever did in the past, and was at such a crazy, transitional and up in the air phase in his insane life that looked nothing like he'd probably anticipated it to not long before it approached, and so he makes this insane, schizophrenic bipolar nightmare of an album where you can practically hear him putting on a different costume every song while trying to see which one would fit. Hell, live even they did the whole thing like some weird theatrical show and had film lights and costume changes in front of everyone.

Honestly, if Unkillable Monster, which is to my ears his absolute worst song by a country mile, wasn't on the tracklisting, I'd probably openly consider myself a real fan of it, even though it'd still be carrying a ton of flaws. I do love a lot about it that many people hate for whatever reason and find the best of it to be among the best of his career. I Have to Look Up ... is amazing and about as good as anything he's made post-Triptych and especially post-comeback from Lest We Forget. I even am one of those weirdos who thinks I Want to Kill You ... is fantastic, and I love the wild, unhinged and off-the-rails-at-any-moment vibe of that track. In general, it's an album that is the sound of a speeding train losing its balance and threatening to tip over at any second, and I can't help but enjoy that in some way. It's a real spectacle and to me fits everything Marilyn Manson is, with all of the best dumped in with all of the worst and mixed up hard to the point that it's sometimes hard to tell them apart from one another.

Honestly, if Unkillable Monster, which is to my ears his absolute worst song by a country mile, wasn't on the tracklisting, I'd probably openly consider myself a real fan of it,

I love unkillable monster!! I never understood the hate for that song. I don't mind it at all. There are by far worst songs in his catalog. I don't mind THEOL. It's defiantly not his best work, but it's kind of an underrated album. I think the worst goes to Eat Me, Drink Me.

Out of curiosity, what would everyone say are the worst Manson songs? I know everyone's opinion is going to be so DRASTIC regarding this, but I'm curious what songs of his people dislike from his discography. I'd say:

The Golden Age of Grotesque
Ka Boom-Ka Boom
If I was your Vampire
They say that hell is not hot
Just a car crash away
Are you the rabbit?
WOW
15
Murderers are getting prettier every day
Slave only dreams to be king

Interesting how I couldn't find a weak song on his first 4 records. First record with songs I didn't like was GAOG. I never liked that album when it came out. I think I might be brave enough to say that I like THEOL more than GAOG!

Actually, while I was looking at wikipedia at a list of songs per album to come up with this list, THEOL really isn't that bad AT ALL. I like about 70% of that record.

Agreed, although my only criticism of Holy Wood is I feel the songs are almost too short, and there is too many of them. I cant think of any specifically I would have gotten rid of, and this would have been something that could have been fixed when they were writing/recording the album.

As far as GOAG goes, (and I know I talked about this in one of the previous 2 Manson threads (geez)) there is too much filler material (especially in the 2nd half of the disc), and the album would have worked much much better as an EP (especially with the themes, it seem like they forgot about the Wiemar German dirty 30s type them that the first half had.) This is the way I have it ripped on my computer...

This is a little longer than EP length, but it cuts the crap and keeps the sauce. I feel like this album was the beginning of his downfall, because besides Four Rusted Horses, I cant think of another song off the next 3 albums that I actually like. Im going to link this youtube vid about those albums in comparison to his first couple works, because I think this is an interesting view on this topic...

Anyways, I really really enjoyed The Pale Emperor. I had said for years that Manson has always worked best when he has somebody to help him focus his ideas, and this is proof. There are no filler tracks on this album, nothing sucks, everything is diverse and creative, and I would rank it right up there with POAF, MA, and Holy Wood. (ACSS is and will always be the best IMO.)

As far as this new album goes, I havent heard the new song, but im approaching this with hesitation, because I want him to rock again but im worried it might be more filler. Im glad he is working with Tyler Bates again, so im cautiously optimistic about it.

Please dont delete this thread because I dont want to go over all this a 4th time!!!!

It's odd, people who dislike GAOG as an album seem to love the title track and those who like the album seem to be pretty indifferent towards it. It's definitely what I wish the entire record sounded like.

My least favorites in no real order but with an attempt to get something from as many albums as possible:

Organ Grinder
Disposable Teens
Unkillable Monster
Para-Noir
Slutgarden
This Is the New Shit
Hey, Cruel World
Pistol Whipped
Disengaged (this might actually be my least favorite song of his)
Children of Cain
Breaking the Same Old Ground
Wormboy (not a band song, but totally Spooky Kids rather than Antichrist era and in turn slows the ride down a little too much for me)
They Said That Hell's Not Hot

I don't even necessarily hate or dislike all of these songs, but they're all ones I could do without. If we were allowing covers, then Tainted Love would be way high up on this list, as would a few others he's done.

My least favourite would be... let's say any 10 from Born Villain. I absolutely despise that record.
Other than that, I almost always skip Disposable Teens and mObscene for being overplayed as fuck and also almost exact ripoffs of The Beautiful People/Rock Is Dead and The Fight Song, respectively (but worse).

Yes the variety of peoples opinions on his bad songs is interesting. I enjoy wormboy, didnt when it came out but now i do. If i was your vampire isnt a bad song (but i do prefer EMDM over anything else he has done since that). Now, manson songs can be bad for really only two reasons in my opinion. Either the music sucks or the vocals/lyrics suck. Sometimes a song sounds really good but he is saying the usual hell or death or satan or whatever other controversial thing hes into at the moment and it ruins it. Other times the lyrics are decent but the music is just bad. Sometimes both. Its rare to have it all be good anymore. Holy Wood is the closest to perfection hes ever come IMO which is funny because the lyrics are all death death death. But it worked back then. That album is brutal as fuck in a good way, start to finish.

Favorites for me SINCE Holy Wood, or i should say, the only songs i like since HW....
-Golden age of Grotesque(the song)- whole album should have been done in this old timey dark sound
-Spade
-MOST of EMDM- i dont get the hate for this one. Its stripped down, the music is great, its like a MM garage band sound. The lyrics i guess? The only ones i dont like are They said hell.....and Mutilation. Lyrics to Heart shaped glasses are bad. Everything else is decent enough and again, better than anything after it.
-Pretty as a swastika- music is awesome on this one, the second verse when the double time high hat kicks in being the best part
-Four rusted- yeah more on death and coffins but the sound is something different for him
-Wight spider- a straight up rock song
-I have to look up- best song since holy wood, shouldve called it the high end of low as do we really need another long title with the word hell in it? Also, version 2 is really good.
-Children of cain- reminds me of ACS era manson
-lay down your...- another great rock song without hell or satan or anything like that in the chorus vocals. Great guitar work, the little flourishes in the verses (with the wah pedal) sound very Daisy to me.
-Odds of even- not sure why i like this one but i think its the best and only part of TPE i really enjoy. The other songs have good parts but not as whole songs.

I dont know if i grew out of his lyrical content or if i think he is trying way too hard to be "dark", but i find that thats what usually holds me back from liking his stuff lately.